
ESSAYS ON 



Practical Poultry Keeping 



IN CALIFORNIA 



Reprinted from articles published 
in the Los Angeles Times Illus- 
trated Weekly, with additions 
and plans of poultry buildings 

By 
MAJOR C. DEVONSHIRE 



Copyright, 1914, by Major Charles Devonshire 



Price, Post Free, 50 Cents 






ESSAYS ON 

Practical Poultry Keeping 

IN CALIFORNIA 



By 
MAJOR C. DEVONSHIRE 



PREFACE 



These essays, with the exception of the last two, and the drawings were published 
as a series of articles in the Poultry Section of the Los Angeles Times Illustrated 
Weekly, by the authorization and consent of Gen. Harrison Gray Otis, Editor 
in Chief, to whom the best thanks of the author are due. The very kind 
reception given to them by the public, as evidenced by the large number of 
letters of congratulation and inquiry received by the writer from all parts of the 
Western States, has encouraged him to put them into pamphlet form. These essays 
aim to be a slight contribution towards the standardization of the methods of raising 
poultry in California. The writer has long felt that many are deterred from entering 
the poultry business owing to the multiplicity and elaborate character of methods 
recommended to them. The general acceptance of certain simple and, as far as is 
consistent with efficiency, economical methods — economical that is both of money and 
labor — would seem to be urgently needed. The writer has been engaged for many 
years in the attempt to ascertain the root principles underlying all poultry raising 
and to endeavor by exhaustive experimental work, to lay the foundation of a standard- 
ization of methods, i.e., of methods which would become generally recognized as well 
calculated to produce financially good — if not indeed, the best results. 

His general conclusions are submitted in this pamphlet. 



' 



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APR -6 19 



CHAPTER I. 

["Memorandum upon investigations" as to the 
mineral ash in average soils and foodstuffs 
available for stock and poultry, carried out in 
South Africa, Great Britain, Canada and Cali- 
fornia, during the years 1903-1913, inclusive, by 
the author.] 

MY attention was first drawn to this 
subject in 1903-5 in connection with 
my investigation into a disease of 
poultry in South Africa commonly known as 
the "poultry sickness" or "the sickness." 
This disease was common to all the states 
of the South African Union, and its ravages 
were so severe that no poultry industry 
existed in South Africa, as capital could not 
be obtained for the business. 

The peculiarity of the disease was that 
no symptoms either before or after death 
could be detected. Birds apparently well 
over night were found dead ' under the 
perches in the morning, and whole flocks 
were frequently decimated within a week 
following the appearance of the disease. 

The writer visited a large number of 
farms where a few fowls ran at liberty 
around the barns, this being the extent to 
which poultry keeping was followed on the 
vast majority of farms in the Union. Cure 
was impossible, and the steps taken to pre- 
vent the disease were the subject of my 
inquiries. In every case I found that where 
the disease had been more or less warded 
off, mineral matter, such as epsom salts, 
soda, lime and certain bitter herbs, pre- 
sumably rich in some mineral salt, had 
been used. 

Recourse to books upon the composition 
of soils and foodstuffs showed that mineral 
matter ("mineral ash" or "earth salts") 
was always present. Further, that this 
"mineral ash" was essential to maintain the 
processes of life — that it may aptly be com- 
pared to the few drops of oil without which 
the machinery clogs or stops altogether. 
Thus without a sufficiency of "ash," the gas- 
tric juice will not form, nor can the secre- 
tions of the bile, liver and intestines be 
maintained; the blood is largely composed 
of "mineral ash," also the feathers and 
hides of birds and live stock respectively. 

I came to the conclusion that the "ash" 
available to birds and farm stock was de- 
ficient in the soils and foodstuffs of South 
Africa, and that it would be necessary to 
artificially manufacture the "ash" and add 
it to the foodstuffs. 

In May, 1905, I submitted an article upon 
the "Feeding of Poultry" to the Director of 
Agriculture, Orange River Colony (now the 
Free State,) in which I stated that the great 
majority of diseases among poultry were 
due to a deficiency of mineral ash, available 
to the birds in the soils and foodstuffs. 
This article was published by order of the 
Director of Agriculture in the official organ 
of the government, The Farmers' Advocate, 
in the June issue, 1905. Eight years' work 
to test the truth of this proposition have 



verified it beyond the shadow of a doubt. 

Not being a chemist myself, and there 
being no chemist attached to the Agricul- 
tural Department of the colony, I was un- 
able to get a formula which would represent 
the missing ash. In the following August, 
however, I saw a formula published in the 
July issue of the Reliable Poultry Journal, 
which reached South Africa about six weeks 
after publication in the United States. 

If I remember aright, this formula not only 
professed to give the mineral ash constitu- 
ents, but also included some vegetable sub- 
stances found in foodstuffs. It was a very 
expensive and elaborate formula. After 
sending to Europe for some of the ingredi- 
ents, the druggist eventually supplied me 
with the powders. Their effect upon the 
poultry was immediate, and established be- 
yond question that the so-called poultry 
sickness was simply starvation of the life 
processes through a deficiency of "ash."" 
Given the use of the artificial ash, no case 
of poultry sickness ever occurred again. 

In the following December, Prof. Juritz, 
one of the chemists of the Agricultural De- 
partment, Cape of Good Hope, wrote an 
article in the Journal of the Agricultural 
Department of that colony entitled "The 
Need for Chemical Research in the Cape 
Colony," in which, referring to the results 
of the chemical survey of the soils of Cape 
Colony to date, he stated that he had re- 
ported to the government that he found the 
soils deficient in mineral ash available for 
plant nutrition, that the plants were there- 
fore deficient, and "that the animals graz- 
ing thereon must, in the long run, be seri- 
ously affected." 

In the middle of 1906 I was able to go to 
the Transvaal, and immediately submitted 
my work to Prof. Ingle, chief of the chem- 
istry division, Agricultural Department, 
Transvaal. 

This gentleman frankly admitted that my 
theory was entirely new to him, and in 1909, 
after we had both returned to England, he 
again acknowledged the theory as having 
originated with me, in a private letter writ- 
ten to me in that year. 

I asked Prof. Ingle to investigate my 
view that the low feeding value of Trans- 
vaal-grown oats for horses (which was uni- 
versally acknowledged to be the case) was 
due to a deficiency of ash in the oats. 

Analysis of these oats by him established 
the truth of my view. (See article, "The 
Mineral Ash in the Foodstuffs," by Prof. 
Ingle, Journal of the Agricultural Depart- 
ment, Transvaal, April issue, 1907.) As far 
as I am aware, I was the first to demon- 
strate that, contrary to the universally re- 
ceived opinion, the feeding value of a food- 
stuff may depend almost entirely upon the 
amount and composition of the ash found 
in it, rather than upon the proteids, fats, 
etc. 

Further, it is a remarkable fact that 



horses, whether imported or not, in South 
Africa, will eagerly devour locusts when- 
ever they can get them. This abnormal ap- 
petite for animal food in herbivorous ani- 
mals had never been explained. I asked 
Prof. Ingle to analyze the locust, as I be- 
lieved that it would be found to be abnor- 
mally rich in ash, and that the craving of 
the horse for mineral matter led to his par- 
tiality for the locust. 

This theory proved to be true. The lo- 
cust's body was found to be abnormally 
rich in ash, especially lime. (See his article, 
Journal, Transvaal Agricultural Depart- 
ment, July, 1907.) 

The contention, therefore, that "the min- 
eral ash is always abundant and generally 
in excess in the foodstuffs" must be aban- 
doned, as of universal application, although 
it may be true in rare instances, where 
plants are grown in soils abnormally rich 
in ash. 

(As to the extreme variability of the ash 
content, both as regards composition and 
amount even in grains of the same species, 
see Prof. Jordan's "The Feeding of Animals" 
in his chapter on the subject.) 

It is frequently forgotten that no farm 
animal draws the whole of its supply of ash 
exclusively from the foodstuffs, and that no 
foodstuffs, however rich in ash, could fur- 
nish the amount required, since farm ani- 
mals and poultry draw a large proportion of 
the ash direct from the soil. 

In South Africa, before the country was 
fenced, stock would travel for many miles 
to lick deposits of mineral matter found in 
isolated spots. 

It is a common thing to see horses, on 
being let out from the barn, eating earth. 
This indicates a craving for mineral mat- 
ter, which is satisfied by adding the artifi- 
cial as"h to the animal's ration, when it will 
not again have recourse. to eating earth. 

The "deer lick" is familiar in California 
as indicating some spot frequented by deer 
where they can lick some deposit of min- 
eral matter found there. 

A well-known California cattleman recent- 
ly asked the writer: "What do my cattle 
on free range in the mountains find there 
which they do not get when kept in the 
barn? My cattle in the mountains rarely 
abort, while those in the barn are often sick 
and frequently abort." 

The explanation is that without abundant 
mineral matter the cow cannot construct 
the framework of the foetus in the womb, 
since the supply of ash available to her in 
the barn is insufficient, oftentimes, for her 
own needs, let alone those of the growing 
foetus. In other words, the food given in 
the barn can] ot furnish a sufficiency of 
ash, however rich that food may be in ash. 
It is, however probably true to say that 
the majority of foods are deficient, rather 
than otherwise, in ash, as the bulk of the 
soils in which they are grown are almost 



certainly deficient in ash. The cow in the 
mountains supplements the supply in the 
foodstuffs by licking the deposits of ash 
which she finds in the soils. 

As regards poultry, the foregoing is also 
true, in that they depend for the bulk of 
their supply of "ash" upon the grit which 
they can pick up. 

It is certain that fowls eat grit, not merely 
for the mechanical action set up by grit 
in the gizzard, but mainly for the mineral 
ash contained in the grit. This grit is dis- 
solved by the acid of the gastric juice and 
the particular "salt" contained in the grit 
is thereby liberated and assimilated by the 
bird like any other food constituent. The 
artificial ash is therefore assimilated by the 
fowl as a food constituent and not as a 
medicine. 

The following facts would seem to estab- 
lish conclusively the truth of the contention 
of the previous paragraph: 

Birds were found by the writer on part 
of a farm where the poultry sickness was 
unknown. Two miles away, on the same 
farm, birds were dying rapidly of the sick- 
ness. 

Examination of the range of the healthy 
birds showed a deposit of gravel rich in ash. 
It was also shown that the birds frequented 
this deposit. A wagon load of this gravel 
was taken over to the sick birds, which 
eagerly devoured it, and the sickness disap- 
peared in a few days. 

The conclusion is irresistible that the 
mineral matter in the grit must have been 
dissolved in the gizzard and assimilated by 
the bird like other food constituents. One 
enormously important deduction is that it 
furnishes the explanation of the well-known 
fact that birds confined in runs, or ranging 
over the same ground for a long period of 
time, will deteriorate (and that that deteri- 
oration becomes more and more rapid the 
longer the birds are kept in the same run.) 
The birds exnaust the supply of mineral grit 
available on the surface of the run. Anaemia 
immediately follows, and the power of the 
bird to resist disease is weakened, the germi- 
cides in the blood are enfeebled, and any 
of the following diseases may ensue: Leg 
weakness, diarrhoea, roup, catarrh, diph- 
theria, poor egg yields and infertile eggs, 
weakling chicks, etc. 

Where the vitality is maintained by an 
abundant supply of ash, these diseases are 
unknown, except in isolated cases where 
the bird has a poor constitution, or where 
there is gross mismanagement of the stock. 

The connection between deterioration in 
confinement and exhaustion of surface grit 
was established by the experiments made 
for me by Prof. Brown. (See Journal, 
Board of Agriculture. Great Britain, Novem- 
ber, 1909.) 

It is probably true to say that it is im- 
possible to maintain a flock in confinement 
over a period of years without artificially 



adding the mineral ash to the ration, except 
in the rare cases where the supply of ash 
is renewed by nature, e. g., in the case of a 
stream bringing down fresh supplies of grit 
when in flood. 

If grit rich in ash is procurable, which 
is very rarely the case, this constitutes an 
artificial addition of the ash to the ration. 

I omitted to mention that Prof. Ingle 
thought that he could construct a simple and 
inexpensive formula. He did so, and, after 
modification by me, remarkable results have 
invariably been obtained. 

We can now sum up the position as de- 
fined by the "experts." 

They tell us (1) that the mineral ash is 
vitally important to the birds; (2) that the 
ash content of grains varies enormously, 
i. e., that the supply of mineral ash in the 
foodstuffs is variable and precarious; (3) 
that the supply is always abundant and 
generally in excess; (4) that in spite of this, 
we must always add salt and lime to the 
ration and furnish abundant supplies of grit. 

We then have paragraph 3 contradicting 
paragraph 2 and paragraph 4 contradicting 
paragraph 3. Thus (2) the supply of ash 
is precarious, but (3) it is always abundant; 
and, on the other hand, (4) you must artifi- 
cially supply the salts, e. g., salt, lime and 
grit, which are, according to paragraph 3 
always abundant and generally in excess. 
We leave the experts to fight it out. 

My general conclusions are that our 
methods of feeding require modification. 

To illustrate this contention, let us sup- 
pose that our birds are running down. We 
rush to the rescue with costly and indigest- 
ible mashes. The egg yield may be pre- 
served for a time, but the eggs will not 
hatch or only produce a small percentage 
of weakly chicks. The digestive organs of 
the breeding stock are ruined and with 
them the nervous system is deranged. This 
derangement is shown in the morbid dis- 
ease of the offspring known as toe picking. 

The trouble really is that the materials 
for the gastric juice and the vital processes 
of the breeding stock are deficient, owing to 
a lack of ash, and instead of increasing the 
flow of the gastric juice by increasing the 
supply of ash, we ply the unfortunate birds 
with richer rations, although they cannot 
digest even the simplest rations with the 
diminished gastric juice available. 

The machinery of the bird's body is so 
perfect that it will convert any ration which 
contains the necessary proteids and fats into 
eggs, provided that the wheels of the ma- 
chinery are oiled. This can only be done by 
the mineral ash, which is thus seen to be 
the most vital factor in the problem of 
feeding poultry. 

The despised and neglected ash, which is 
dismissed in a paragraph in most poultry 
books, is now found to be the elixir vitae 
the only source of nourishment to the vital 
processes — the only oil which will grease 



the wheels of life, of the machinery of the 
body. If the machinery clogs or stops, it is 
useless to fill the furnaces with fuel. I 
have seen hundreds of birds with full crops 
dying of starvation because there was a 
total stoppage of the flow of the gastric 
juice. The digestive organs had gone on 
strike and the food remained passive in the 
crop. A large dose of mineral ash has fre- 
quently started the machine again in a few 
hours, and the bird was none the worse. 

After seeing thousands of birds, I am of 
the opinion that very few of them were not 
suffering more or less from a deficiency of 
ash available to them. After breeding thous- 
ands of birds, I am satisfied that where 
abundance of ash is provided, with a sim- 
ple and varied ration far more remarkable 
results follow than have ever been produced 
from debilitated birds which are forced with 
rich rations. 

Prof. Ingle once observed to me that the 
addition of the artificial ash to the ration 
was the greatest advance made in animal 
nutrition in his lifetime. 



CHAPTER 2. 

THE FEEDING OF HENS. 

There are of course as many ways of feed- 
ing chickens as there are foodstuffs suit- 
able for them, plus the countless ways in 
which these may be combined. The follow- 
ing methods are offered, as the result of 
eight years' use, under many conditions of 
climate from tropical heat to zero weather. 
Good paying results have always been ob- 
tained by me from their use, and while I 
fully recognize that improvement is always 
our goal, I venture to believe that these 
methods have yielded results sufficiently 
satisfactory to warrant their use, failing any 
better method known to individual poultry- 
men. 

The question of exercise for the fowls is 
so intimately bound up with the value to 
the bird of the food given that it is impos- 
sible to discuss the one without the other. 
I am convinced that the following may be 
accepted as a fundamental truth: "The 
hotter the climate, the greater the exercise 
required by the hen in confinement." In 
the tropics I had to increase the depth of 
the scratching litter to eight inches to coun- 
teract the tendency of the heavy breeds to 
lay on too much fat. I am of opinion, after 
two years' work with hens in California, 
that the scratching shed is the most impor- 
tant factor, outside feeding, in success with 
poultry in this State. I will even go so far 
as to say that, feed how you will, if there 
is no scratching litter provided, vigorous 
hens and large egg yields are impossible. 
By egg yields I mean strongly-fertilized 
eggs. 

"It was once remarked that market eggs 
are of three kinds: "the new-laid," "the 
fresh," and "THE egg." Hens in poor con- 



dition and not provided with scratching lit- 
ter will produce what from the hatching 
point of view, is "the egg." The amount of 
grain thrown into the litter will regulate the 
amount of exercise enforced upon the hun- 
gry hens. The same result may be obtained 
by increasing or otherwise the depth of the 
litter. The grain should be thrown into the 
litter and the latter then turned over with 
a fork. This is hard work where the 
scratching shed is a large one, but it pays. 
There should always be grain in the litter 
(left from overnight) in the early morning. 
The birds come off the perches more or 
less stiff and cold, and it is impossible to 
overestimate the value to the egg yield if 
the birds can go straight into the litter, 
where they know that their labor will be re- 
warded with grain. Circulation of the blood 
and a healthy appetite are insured so that 
they will do justice to the mash at 8 a.m. 

After breakfast the birds should be seen 
cleaning their feathers or lying about asleep 
in the shade, followed in the case of self- 
respecting hens by the production of an 
egg before 3 o'clock. As the sun goes 
down, the birds will start work in the litter 
again, the grain having been replenished 
about 3:30 by the poultryman. The birds 
will scratch away until roosting time, when 
about one-third of the total grain fed should 
be thrown on the open ground so that full 
crops will be insured to the flock, in case 
their labors in the litter should not have 
produced that result. 

Too much exercise is as bad in its effect 
upon the egg yield as too little. If too much 
work is enforced, surplus energy intended 
for egg production will be consumed in the 
effort of scratching. The proportion of the 
total grain fed in the litter to that fed on 
the ground must be determined by observa- 
tion and the judgment of the poultryman, 
but I think that from one-third to one-half 
of the grain should be fed on the ground, 
the amount being increased or otherwise 
according as the evenings are cold or the 
reverse. 

As to the composition of the mash, I have 
used for eight years two parts by weight 
delete bran and one part by weight corn 
meal. This gives a ratio of about one part 
of protein to five of fat and carbohydrates. 
There is a strong prejudice against corn as 
a food for chickens. It is alleged that there 
is difficulty in obtaining sound corn. This 
evil can be remedied, and is no argument 
against corn as such. 

It must be remembered that fowls require 
a certain amount of fat in their ration. Fat 
and the fatty substances are the fuel which 
is consumed in the body and furnishes en- 
ergy. The effort of scratching consumes 
so much fuel or fat. Corn is rich in fat and 
carbohydrates, and corn is the most easily 
digested of all grains, i. e., practically the 
whole grain is digested. Speaking from 
memory, only about 70 per cent, of brain is 



digested, the other 30 per cent, passing 
through the body, whereas about 98 per cent, 
of the corn is digested. The crude protein 
in corn is more digestible than that of 
wheat, so that though the latter amounts 
to 15 per cent, of the dry matter, and the 
former to only 10 per cent, (more or less,) 
it is questionable whether the feeding value 
of the protein of corn is not as great as 
that of wheat. 

Again, the feeding of materials deficient 
in fat with the idea of depriving the bird 
of fatty matter defeats itself, since the bird 
will make the surplus protein in the ration 
do duty for fat. This probably places un- 
necessary strain upon the digestive organs, 
and as foods rich in proteids are generally 
more expensive than those which are rich in 
fat, there is false economy in forcing the 
hen to use the proteids to do duty for fat. 

It is contended that corn is very heating. 
This implies that the fat of corn contains 
some specially heating matter, but is this 
true? Does fat vary in its composition? 
Is not fat always fat, whether found in corn 
or elsewhere? It is a question for the chem- 
ists. Assuming that there is some distinct- 
ive quality of a heating nature in corn, can 
we not balance or counteract it with some 
other food? Bran is rich in certain salts 
which make it cooling to the blood and 
slightly laxative in its effects. If therefore 
we mix bran with the corn meal, we should 
produce an ideal ration, and such I have 
found it. 

The truth seems to be that the corn is 
not to blame, but the trouble seems to lie 
in the lack of vitality so common in our 
hens, and the absence of scratching litter 
in so many yards. Feed corn to debilitated 
hens without means of exercise and the re- 
sults will be disastrous. 

Letters are reaching me daily which 
clearly show how widespread is debility or 
lack of vitality in our flocks and how fully 
their owners realize that this is the cause 
and root of all our troubles with poultry. 

A healthy lad will eat food of every de- 
scription, beginning with the tough beef- 
steak at 8 o'clock in the morning, followed 
by a raid upon the larder about 11 as an 
appetizer for a heavy luncheon at 1 p.m., 
etc., and all this relieved at intervals by 
recourse to the candy box. He eats all the 
candy sometimes, and not only survives, but 
flourishes exceedingly. Surely the explana- 
tion is that he has abounding vitality. My 
experience with poultry is that if abound- 
ing vitality is secured, any surplus food at 
all suitable will be converted into eggs. 
This again involves the consumption of • 
more fatty foods, like that of the candy by 
the healthy boy, since the more energy is 
expended, the more fuel will be required, 
and this is furnished by the fat. 

I feed a different grain every day — oats, 
barley, wheat and corn in succession. 
Given abounding vitality, the greater the 



variety of grain fed the better. In this con- 
nection, note the varied ration of the 
healthy boy. 

If hens are debilitated, meat scrap must 
be fed cautiously, since I have seen morbid 
craving for animal food set up in such birds. 
If vitality is abounding, I put beef scrap be- 
fore the birds all the time, as they do not 
consume it to excess. The amount of ani- 
mal life, such as grasshoppers, etc., avail- 
able to the bird, it is difficult, if not impos- 
sible, to calculate, and if this animal life is 
available, the beef scrap will be passed by. 

Morbid cravings for any particular food, 
and morbid tendencies such as toe picking 
in chickens are always a sign of some con- 
stituent being lacking in the food of the 
breeding stock. 



CHAPTER 3. 



NOTES ON THE RAISING OF CHICKENS. 

PRELIMINARY CONSIDERATIONS. 

A QUESTION preliminary to the con- 
sideration of this subject is: "What 
is the proper time to hatch chickens?" 
The vast majority of those who keep poul- 
try want their spring-hatched pullets to 
start laying from the 1st to the 15th of Oc- 
tober, or by the beginning of November at 
the latest. The "proper" time is here as- 
sumed to mean the date at which chickens 
must be hatched so that they will be fully 
matured and beginning to lay during Octo- 
ber. 

Experience all over the world estab- 
lishes the rule that light breeds require 
five and a half to six months and heavy 
breeds six and a half to seven months, as 
a general average period, in which to reach 
maturity. 

It might therefore be supposed that if we 
hatch our chicks of the light breeds on the 
1st of April they will come into lay on Octo- 
ber 1, and chicks of the heavy breeds 
hatched on April 1 will begin to lay on Oc- 
tober 15 to November 1. 

This is my own View, and I believe that 
the best time to hatch chicks in California 
is from April 1 to May 1 for fall laying. 

This opinion is not shared by everyone. 
I am often told that chicks must be 
hatched early, and many people believe that 
February and March are the proper months 
to hatch. Some even go so far as to assert 
that these months are the natural breed- 
ing season. 

I believe that this opinion has arisen from 
two main causes, of which the first is the 
observed fact that if young chicks do not 
reach a certain (undefined) stage of growth 
before the hot weather sets in, they will 
remain in a stunted condition all the sum- 
mer, only resuming growth in the fall and 
not coming into lay until the following 
spring. The second cause is that where 
chicks are artificially hatched, it is found 



difficult to operate the incubators in April 
and May, owing to the heat of the weather. 

With regard to the first, I will show that 
the heat of summer has nothing to do with 
the failure of the chickens to grow, and 
that the second cause is due to mechanical 
defects in the construction of the incuba- 
tor-house. 

Before dealing with these questions, let 
us pause a moment to ask what month does 
the hen for the most part select in which 
to raise her chicks? I am confident that if 
a man lias 100 heavy hens, he will find that 
30 per cent, of them will want to hatch 
their chicks about the third week in April 
and 40 per cent, more of them will go 
broody early in May. I have been forced 
to this conclusion by the actual facts pre- 
sented to me in California by a flock of 100 
farmyard hens under my care last year dur- 
ing the spring months. 

In Northern California, above Sacra- 
mento, April 15 is the date after which no 
frost has ever been known; the nights are 
then getting warmer, the grasses and ani- 
mal life are abundant. Surely this is the 
period which the hen would select, if left 
to herself, at which to go broody, so that 
her offspring would get the benefit of the 
abundant natural food supplies then avail- 
able. I have also observed that chickens 
hatched at this time will grow much faster 
and suffer much less from disease and mor- 
tality than early-hatched chicks. The great 
variation in temperature between midday 
and midnight is then much diminished 
owing to the warmer nights. 

To return to the question of the effects 
of summer heat upon young chicks, I am 
satisfied that so far from being injurious to 
them, it is beneficial. My convictions are 
largely the result of experience in the trop- 
ics. The widespread opinion to the con- 
trary is due to a failure to perceive the 
true cause of the stunted condition of the 
chicks in hot weather. I had the good for- 
tune to have an opportuity of testing, 
under the most exacting conditions, the 
real truth about this matter. It is hardly 
too much to say that if the contention that 
heat in Southern California stunts the 
growth of chicks is true, the poultry indus- 
try in this district will never assume the 
dimensions of a great industry. If we are 
forced to keep chicks eight or nine months 
before they will begin to lay — i. e., if we 
must hatch in February to get fall layers, 
the extra feed bill for two months will put 
us out of business against the man who can 
get his pullets to start laying at six months 
old. And generally, if we have no guaran- 
tee that the growth of our pullets may not 
be arrested at any time by a heat wave, 
the business of raising chicks becomes too 
precarious to tempt the majority. 

The test made by me was carried out 
under the following conditions: Last July 
15 I took charge of 150 pullets which had 



been hatched on April 1, and which were 
accordingly three and a half months old. 
These birds were the most stunted, miser- 
able looking lot that I ever saw. The aver- 
age weight per bird was but little over one 
pound and they looked like poorly-managed 
six-weeks-old chicks. I was told that the 
heat had overtaken them before the myste- 
rious stage of growth had been reached, 
after which their progress toward maturity 
would not be injuriously affected by the hot 
weather. I had little hope myself of being 
able to do anything with this stunted flock, 
and advised that if they could not be ma- 
tured by the middle of October, so that the 
majority would be laying by the 1st of No- 
vember, it would be better to destroy them, 
as it would not pay to keep them until the 
spring, or for nine or ten months, without 
any return from them in eggs. The heat 
during July and August last was exception- 
ally great, and on the theory that chicks 
will not grow in the heat, the conditions 
were as adverse as it is possible to imagine. 
I knew that the failure of the chicks to 
grow all over California was due not to the 
heat, but to a deficiency of mineral matter 
in their ration. In this case, however, I 
believed that that deficiency had been of 
such long duration — to wit, three and a half 
months — that the stunted condition of the 
chicks was, in the case of many of them, 
not remediable, and that only a percentage 
— probably not a large percentage of them 
— would recover. But we live and learn in 
the chicken business, and to my amaze- 
ment, after increasing the mineral ash to 
equal about 5 per cent, of the mash daily, 
the chicks started not merely to grow, but 
to shoot up like mushrooms in the night. 
Still more surprising, only three chickens 
failed to respond, and by the 1st of Oc- 
tober I had a flock of well-grown, large- 
boned pullets, well up to weight, and start- 
ing in to lay well. Although I had long 
been satisfied that "the heat injurious to 
chickens" theory would not hold water for 
one moment, this experiment, so unexpect- 
edly forced upon me, was extremely valu- 
able. Here we had three-and-a-half-months- 
old chicks, with the heat rising over 100 
degrees in the shade daily, for days to- 
gether. 

No more favorable conditions to prove 
the falsity of the statement that chicks will 
not grow in the heat could have been se- 
cured. 

I consider that this experiment is one of 
the most important ever carried out by me, 
and one of which the effects will be of far- 
reaching, if not, indeed, decisive importance 
in determining whether a great poultry in- 
dustry in California is possible; in other 
words, whether the few fowls in the back 
gardens of thousands of wage-earners can 
be depended upon to thrive and reproduce 
themselves, given any reasonable care and 
fair treatment. 



I have said that the difficulty of hatching 
eggs in incubators, after the hot weather 
has begun, is a mechanical difficulty 
merely. In a subsequent article I hope to 
show that an incubator-house can be 
cheaply built which will entirely overcome 
this objection. 

I have not referred to the obvious and 
frequently experienced danger that chick- 
ens hatched in February will begin laying 
in July or August, lay a few eggs, and then 
go into the molt with the old hens. Such 
pullets will probably not resume egg pro- 
duction until January, and will involve 
heavy financial loss. 

Having disposed of the "heat-injurious-to- 
chick-growth" theory, and the "too-hot-to- 
operate-the-incubator" theory as justifying 
February hatching, we can now fix our 
hatching date, in agreement with the known 
experience of all other countries— i. e., for 
light breeds, six months before egg produc- 
tion is required to begin, and for the heavy 
breeds seven months before. 

One other question remains to be con- 
sidered before we have settled our prelimi- 
naries, and that is, "Are incubator-bred 
chicks as good as hen-hatched chicks?' 
The consensus of opinion of experts seems 
to be that very few men can operate an in- 
cubator with sufficient skill to produce a 
chick which is APPARENTLY as good as a 
hen-hatched chick; in other words, that for 
the bulk of poultrymen their incubator 
chicks will not be as good as is necessary. 
Again, even where the greatest skill is avail- 
able to operate the machines, there seems to 
be a slight falling-off in the artificially- 
hatched chicks after two or three genera- 
tions of them have been artificially hatched. 
Where a poultryman wishes to create a 
strain of birds, and must hatch his own 
breeding stock, it would seem advisable to 
hatch a proportion of the breeding stock, 
at least, every year under hens. 



CHAPTER IV. 

NATURAL INCUBATION. 

In my last chapter I urged that chicks of 
all breeds should be hatched from April 1 
to May 1. The problem of how to hatch 
them has now to be considered. The poul- 
tryman who keeps a few hens in the back 
garden, to supply the needs of his house- 
hold in the matter of eggs merely, will prob- 
ably be well advised not to hatch any chicks 
at all, but to purchase well-grown pullets 
early in each fall to replace the old hens 
which should be sold off as soon as they 
finish laving, prior to going into the molt, 
in September. There are many poultry- 
keepers, however, who keep a few fowls 
not merelv for profit, but for the pleasure 
of doing so, and the raising of chicks from 
their pet hens forms a large part of the 
interest attaching to the hobby. A S^ in 
such poultrv-keepers may have choice birds 



8 



of some particular strain, which can only 
be perpetuated yearly by raising chicks 
from them. 

It will be perhaps convenient to consider 
the best way to hatch chicks under hens 
first, as the owner of a few hens will gen- 
erally hatch his chicks by the natural 
method. I should like first, however, to 
point out that the idea that if a hen is given 
free range and allowed to "steal her nest," 
as it is called, better results will always 
follow in the number and quality of the 
chickens hatched, is not always nor per- 
haps even generally true. My own experi- 
ence is that a hen is seldom able to "steal 
a nest" without other hens discovering it 
and laying their eggs there as well. The 
result is that twenty or more eggs ac- 
cumulate in the nest before the original 
hen goes broody and begins to sit. She 
tries to cover all the eggs, with the result 
that all are insufficiently warmed and the 
hatch is a total failure. Again other hens 
will continue to lay there, and the evil will 
be still further aggravated. Last year the 
hatches of ten of my hens which had 
stolen their nests in this way were total 
failures from the causes referred to. Where 
a hen does succeed in stealing a nest, which 
is not discovered by other hens, and after 
laying a clutch of twelve or fifteen eggs, 
goes broody and sits on them, it might be 
thought that, if undisturbed, the best re- 
sults would reward her. In California, 
however, this does not by any means always 
follow. Under normal conditions there is 
sufficient moisture in the ground to enable 
the hen to hatch the eggs. The heat of 
her body draws the moisture in the ground 
to the surface and the eggs will not "dry 
down." In times of drought, however, it 
frequently happens that there is no mois- 
ture in the ground, and the chicks cannot 
get out of the shell, owing to the drying- 
down of the enclosing membrane, and the 
hatch is a failure. The weather is then de- 
nounced as being a "bad year for hatching." 
The remedy is very simple. In all such 
cases, or where the hen is set in some spot 
selected by the poultryman, water should 
be poured liberally round the nest two or 
three times during the hatch. If the ground 
round the nest is thoroughly wetted, the 
heat of the hen's body will draw the mois- 
ture and the eggs get the required amount. 
Water should never be poured into the nest, 
nor the eggs sprinkled or wetted by direct 
contact with water. The air passing over 
the eggs, charged with moisture evaporated 
by the heat of the hen's body is the natural 
and therefore the proper method by which 
the eggs should be moistened. There seems 
little doubt that the principal cause of the 
failure to get good hatches where hens are 
set by the poultryman is due, in California, 
to a failure to supply sufficient moisture to 
prevent the drying-down of the eggs under 
the hen. 



We may now consider the actual proce- 
dure to be followed when a hen goes broody. 
Let us suppose that it is decided not to set 
her in the fowl-house, where she has be- 
come broody, but to remove her to a special 
pen where she will not be disturbed by the 
other hens. If a coop is selected as the 
place in which to set her, it i& important 
that this should be in a shady spot, either 
naturally shaded by trees or shrubs, etc., 
or artificially by a shed overhead. If the 
poultry-house is cool and comfortable and 
the hen is transferred to a coop exposed to 
the heat of the sun, she will not appreciate 
the change and may refuse to sit in her new 
quarters. Again, she should have as much 
room as possible to move about in when 
she leaves the nest. If we watch a hen 
sitting at liberty in the open we shall ob- 
serve that on coming off the nest, the biddy 
will emit a kind of shrieking noise, flap her 
wings and run for a considerable distance 
before she starts to look for food. Appar- 
ently the object of this behavior is to re- 
store the circulation and get rid of the 
cramp which long hours on the nest have 
caused. The cry is apparently caused by 
the pain of the cramp in her legs. 

Many of the failures of hens to sit 
throughout the hatch without deserting are 
undoubtedly due to the fact that the bird 
is so closely confined that she cannot 
"stretch her legs," and becomes sick, diar- 
rhoea being the usual form of the trouble. 
If the sitting coop is placed in a long nar- 
row run (the longer the better,) the greater 
will be the comfort of the hen. I think a 
run sixty feet long is the most ideal ar- 
rangement, but in many cases, of course, 
this cannot be given owing to lack of space. 
A convenient form of coop is one where 
the front is closed permanently except for 
a board twelve inches wide which slides 
out. The bottom of this board is four 
inches from the bottom of the nest, and 
rests on a strip that width, nailed at the 
bottom of the front of the box to hold in 
the nesting material. A two-inch-wide space 
should be left at the top of the front of the 
box for ventilation when the slide is closed. 
The hen should be set in the box on one 
or two eggs and the slide closed. She will 
then be in semi-darkness and may be left 
undisturbed for twenty-four hours. If she 
is then let out and can help herself to food 
and water set for her in the run, she will 
probably go back to the nest of her own 
accord and the slide can be left permanently 
open. If she goes back and settles down 
all right, the nest eggs may be removed at 
night and replaced with the eggs to be 
hatched. There should be no bottom to the 
box, which should rest oh the ground. 

It is a good plan to shape a shallow hol- 
low in the earth and then thoroughly wet 
the ground so that as it dries the hollow 
will set hard. A few wisps of hay may be 
put around the nest and in the hollow. The 



9 



hen should be thoroughly dusted with lice 
powder before being set. Take hold of her 
by the legs and put her on her back with 
the legs in the air and dust her all over the 
breast and between the legs. Put a little 
lice powder in the bottom of the nest. 
Water and cracked corn should be placed 
in the run and a box full of loose earth, as a 
dust bath. The hen should be allowed to 
come off when she likes, and the less she 
is interfered with the better. As I have said 
above, do not forget to keep the ground 
round the nest wet in dry weather. A wet- 
ting about the eighth and sixteenth days 
will be sufficient, probably. Where hens 
are set off the ground, the bottom of the 
box should be filled with earth, so that the 
wetting process can be repeated as on the 
ground. The earth in front of the nest box 
when this is placed on the ground should be 
leveled up to the top of the four-inch strip 
at the bottom of the front of the box, so 
that the chicks can get back into the nest. 
A dozen or more hens can be set in the 
same run. A little care will be necessary 
when a hen is first set, to see that she goes 
back to her own nest. 

It is stated that if the nest boxes be 
painted different colors or otherwise dis- 
tinguished, the hen will recognize her own 
nest by these marks. I have never verified 
this, but it is stated to be a fact on good 
authority, and there is nothing improbable 
in it, as unquestionably hens do very 
quickly recognize their own nests. 

Where a considerable number of hens 
have to be set, it is a good plan to divide 
by a wire partition the poultry-house into 
two parts, all of which are exactly alike 
as regards the arrangements of the nests, 
etc. When a hen goes broody in that part 
of the house reserved for the layers, she 
is simply put through the wire into the 
other part of the house. A setting of eggs 
is put ready for her in an unoccupied nest. 
As a rule, if she is transferred toward 
evening she will at once inspect the nest 
boxes which are identical in appearance 
with those she has left, and on seeing a 
comfortable nest with a clutch of eggs all 
ready, she will as a rule promptly annex 
them and settle down upon them with many 
murmurs of contentment. Except to see 
that for the first day or so she does not go 
back to the wrong nest, if other hens come 
off at the same time as herself to feed, she 
should be left alone until she has hatched 
her chicks, except when water is put round 
her nest on the eighth and sixteenth days, 
when she may be dusted at the same time 
with lice powder. With food and water 
always before her and a good run to 
stretch herself in, she will hatch with as 
much success as if she had stolen her nest 
and sat there under the most favorable 
conditions. 



CHAPTER V. 

ARTIFICIAL HATCHING OF CHICKENS. 

The hatching of chicks by artificial means 
will always possess a great attraction for 
many lovers of poultry, and the writer is 
of the number of those who find that a big 
hatch, say 90 per cent, of the fertile eggs, 
affords a great deal of satisfaction. The 
problem is how to do it. The conditions of 
a problem must be, of course, known, if we 
wish to find a satisfactory solution. 

There is a tendency, I think, to assume 
that the eggs will hatch if the incubator is 
properly managed. If the latter is the case, 
and the hatch is a failure, we are apt to 
blame the incubator. I believe that the in- 
cubator is seldom the principal cause of the 
failure, if it is managed with anything like 
ordinary care. The main causes of failure 
would seem to lie, first, in the condition of 
the breeding stock, and second, in the loca- 
tion of the incubator. In a previous article, 
I gave expression to my strong belief, con- 
firmed more and more as experience is 
gained, that where birds are kept in con- 
finement, in Southern California, strongly 
fertilized eggs, i. e., eggs of high hatching 
value, cannot be obtained year in and year 
out, generation after generation, unless 
scratching lifter is provided and regularly 
turned over daily, when fresh grain is 
thrown into it. Sufficient mineral ash must 
be present in the ration, abundant green 
food, and a clean, open-front house. Natural 
or artificial shade is also a great factor for 
success. In short, the birds must be com- 
fortable. It is sometimes thought that if 
the birds are fed regularly and kept clean, 
the poultryman is entitled to expect the 
birds to do the rest. But this is not neces- 
sarily the result unless in addition the com- 
fort of the birds is very closely studied. 
The provision of comfortable nests is prob- 
ably a not unimportant factor in producing 
high egg yields. It is of course impossible 
to say what influence discomfort in any 
form has upon production, but it is prob- 
ably much greater than is often supposed, 
since the hen is a highly sensitive organ- 
ism. We know that, as a rule, changes of 
diet or of location will have an immediate 
and quite unmistakable effect upon pro- 
duction, and minor discomforts probably 
produce real loss of efficiency, although we 
may not be able with certainty to trace 
their effects. If this is so, we must study 
the habits of the birds in the smallest de- 
tail, if we wish large production. Rest- 
less or listless birds are a sure sign that 
something is wrong. 

Let us suppose that our breeding stock 
is in high fettle, singing away in the litter 
or dozing contentedly in the shade after an 
early morning passed in the litter, followed 
by a good breakfast. We are sure that the 
eggs are of high hatching value, since we 
put twelve under an old hen three weeks 



10 



before, and she hatched the lot. We are 
now ready to start out to emulate her ex- 
ample and get a big hatch. I have found 
that in this climate the eggs should not be 
more than three days old, when put into 
the incubator, if the best results are to be 
obtained. The usual rules should be ob- 
served, of course, as to selection of regu- 
larly shaped eggs, not too large nor too 
small, and with good shells free from the 
mottled appearance, which is easily seen 
by holding the egg before a candle in a 
dark room. 

The machine has, we will suppose, been 
running for a week empty, so as to get 
thoroughly heated and dried throughout. 
We have an even temperature of 102 deg. 
in the machine when we set the eggs. 

The main problem, as I believe, is still 
to be considered, namely, the question of 
location. 

If we watch the old hen on the nest, we 
find free air all round her, which is slowly 
passing over the eggs also, retarded in its 
passage by her feathers and warmed by her 
body. But there is a constant current of 
air passing over the eggs, although slowly, 
since the heat of her body must draw the 
air inward toward her. I am not an expert 
in ventilation, but I assume it to be true 
that if the inside of a room is warmer than 
the outside air, and we then open a window, 
there is a rush of the colder air into the 
room : — we create a forced draught. Appar- 
ently the hen does the same, the heat of 
her body acting like the heated room upon 
the colder outside air, when we open the 
window. If this analogy is correct, we get 
an idea to work upon, namely, that we want 
free currents of pure air, constantly but 
slowly passing over the eggs. No easy mat- 
ter, as we have first to get the pure air to 
flow into the incubator-room and then into 
the. machine. The problem as regards the 
machine is simplified since we have the 
heat of the lamp to correspond to the heat 
of the hen's body and draw the colder sur- 
rounding air. At night when the outside 
air is colder than that inside the incubator- 
room, we can easily get pure air by means 
of ventilators. But in California the tem- 
perature by day outside the room is often 
as great as that inside the room, and if the 
sun plays upon the incubator-house, the 
temperature inside the latter may be even 
slightly greater than that outside. In this 
case, the difference of temperature of the 
inside of the room and that of the outside 
air would not be great enough to cause a 
current of air to flow; the air in the room 
becomes stagnant, the exhausted air from 
the lamp and the eggs will not be replaced, 
and the. embryos in the machine are poi- 
soned. Again the incubator-room may be- 
come so warm that it is found impossible 
to keep the temperature of the machine at 
102 deg. even after putting out the lamp, 
and the embryos are thus not merely poi- 



soned by stagnant and exhausted air, but 
debilitated by too much heat, while the 
time and temper of the poultryman are 
wasted if not exhausted in constant visits 
to the machine to study the thermometer. 

How are we to keep the room cool, and, 
moreover, cooler than the outside air? 

I have found that insulation of the roof 
and walls of the incubator-house is the only 
solution of the problem. 

I build a frame in the usual way, nail 
boards outside the frame, then tack brown 
paper inside the boards. I put more boards 
horizontally inside the frame and put 
brown paper again inside these. This can 
be done by nailing, say, two boards at the 
bottom of the inside wall, and then slip 
brown paper inside them down to the floor 
level. Sawdust is then poured into the 
space between the boards and tamped down 
with a stick. The sawdust holds the brown 
paper firmly against the inside and outside 
boards. If the frame is made of 2-inch by 
4-inch lumber, we can thus get four inches 
of sawdust between the boards which are 
nailed to the 2-inch-wide faces of the 2x4's. 
The process is then repeated by nailing 
two boards at a time until we get to the 
top of the frame. The same method of 
insulating is followed with the roof. Boards 
are nailed to the under side of the rafters. 
Brown paper is put on the upper side of 
these boards and then sawdust filled in 
level with the upper side of the . rafters, 
over which again another layer of boards 
is placed with corrugated iron or roofing 
paper over all. The door should be insu- 
lated in the same way. 

The height of the walls of the incubator- 
house should be ten feet. There should 
be one or more windows placed, length- 
ways, say two feet long by one foot wide, 
and hinged at the bottom, on each wall of 
the house placed immediately under the 
eaves. On still days, all these windows 
should be kept open by day and the door 
also, so that the machine practically stands 
in the open air. If the wind blows fresh 
and there is too much draught, the window 
on that side of the house facing the wind 
should be closed. As the windows are 
hinged at the bottom, it is possible to get 
plenty of air without direct draught upon 
the machines by leaving these windows 
open half an inch, or less, eve.n. The air 
will flow in round the sides and top of the 
window, i.e., upward or across the room, 
but not downward on to the machines. If 
opposite windows are left open, there will 
be a good overhead cross-current of pure 
air. 

To insure the same cross-currents below, 
one or more ventilators always open, are 
placed in each wall on the floor level. This 
will cause a good cross-current too far be- 
low the machine to affect the lamp. 

By this means I have found that the air 
in the incubator-room is always fresh and 



11 



the SMELL OF THE LAMP CANNOT BE 
DETECTED. Where there is a smell of 
lamps there is insufficient ventilation. 

At night the windows are closed, the 
fresh air coming in through the perma- 
nently open ventilators. 

The walls and roof do not get hot, and 
the room will remain at a lower tempera- 
ture than 93 deg. when that outside is over 
100 deg. This enables the incubators to be 
operated and if a machine fitted with a 
sleeve on the wick attached to the regula- 
tor is used, there will be no trouble in 
maintaining an even temperature, in any 
weather likely to be experienced up to the 
first of June, or even later. 

This method insures plenty of fresh-air 
currents passing through the machine and 
has this great advantage. First, it does 
away with the necessity of cooling the eggs. 
Simply turn the eggs and put them straight 
back into the machine. They get all the 
fresh air they need, and cooling is unneces- 
sary and undesirable. For the beginner, 
and even for the experienced operator, this 
is a great advantage. 

Second, the moisture question is also 
solved. Since currents of pure air passing 
constantly over the eggs will dry them out, 
we may use moisture in the moisture trays 
from beginning to end of the hatch. If just 
before the eggs pip it is thought desirable, 
boiling water may be put into the trays to 
rapidly produce additional moisture. 

As near as we can, we have imitated the 
free-air and free-moisture method of the 
hen. 

By this procedure I have always secured 
large hatches in California, South Africa 
and elsewhere, and the quality of the chicks 
produced is something to be seen before it 
is believed. 

They are products of pure air moistened 
and heated before it passes over them when 
in the shell, and pure air moreover which 
is constantly renewed throughout the hatch. 
I should perhaps mention that I run the 
machine at 102 deg. for the first week, 102^ 
deg. for the second week, 103 to 103 % for 
the third week. 



CHAPTER VI. 

CHICK FEEDING. 

Let us suppose that we have, to our great 
satisfaction, secured a big hatch of chicks — 
strong, lusty little fellows, eager to get out 
and try conclusions with the world. How 
soon shall we feed them after hatching and 
where shall we put them? I saw that some 
expert in an address given, I think to the 
American Poultry Association, advocated 
feeding chicks as soon as possible after 
they had hatched. This doctrine was new 
and rather startling to me, and my first 
feeling was to reject it altogether; but it 
is necessary to keep an open mind on mat- 
ters connected with poultry raising. The 



views firmly and even universally held to- 
day may be discarded tomorrow and we are 
always learning. 

Pending further experience, I am doubt- 
ful as to the wisdom of feeding chicks im- 
mediately after hatching, simply because 
the hen does not appear to do so. Again 
and again I have observed that a hen will 
sit close on her newly-hatched brood for 
twenty-four hours, so that it is impossible 
to say how many chicks she has hatched, 
until she brings them off or is removed to 
a coop. Again and again twenty-four hours 
after the date on which the chicks, were 
due, I have seen a hen sitting hard and no 
sign of a chick to lae seen. On raising her 
to take her to her new quarters, I have 
found that she has twelve or thirteen 
chicks — a 100 per cent, hatch — under her, 
all fast asleep in. the bottom of the nest. I 
generally remove a hen at night to her new 
coop, so that the chicks may get at least 
another twelve hours' sleep before day- 
break. This gives thirty-six or even forty- 
eight hours before the chicks are fed, and 
they are certainly never the worse for the 
quiet hours after the struggle of hatching. 
As a rule the hen will call them from under 
her, if breakfast is given in the morning, 
but they eat very little and soon go back to 
sleep again for a few hours under her 
wings. From the practice of the hen, there 
does not seem to be any justification for 
feeding chicks immediately after hatching, 
and I should not depart from my rule of 
not feeding for thirty-six hours or more 
without strong evidence that this is desir- 
able. 

I put a match between the door of the in- 
cubator and the frame to admit abundant 
fresh air, and hang sacks over the glass or. 
better, paste paper over it, to darken the 
interior, following what seems to me to be 
the practice of the hen. It appears to be 
a convenient rule to remove the chicks from 
the incubator late in the afternoon, so that 
they only have time for one good meal be- 
fore dark. If they are put into the brooder 
earlier in the day, the poultryman has to 
watch them all day, as they will not go un- 
der the hover readily, and may get chilled. 
I have found that after one night under 
the hover — provided always that this is 
warm enough — the chicks require no further 
schooling, but will always run to the heat 
when tney require it. 

Much, very much, depends upon the im- 
pression left upon the chick's mind of the 
brooder hover during the first night. If 
this is warm and comfortable, the favorable 
impression is apparently never forgotten, 
but if the hover is too cold and the chicks 
crowd, the results are disastrous. The 
habit of crowding once acquired is probably 
never lost, even if the heat is subsequently 
increased, and the discomfort of the first 
night under the hover is never forgotten. 
The result is that the chicks do not return 



12 



readily to the hover when cold, because 
they do not associate that spot with the 
ideas of warmth and comfort. Many will 
therefore get chilled and die, even if the 
lack of warmth is remedied after the first 
night. 

The brooder should be thoroughly heated 
some days before the chicks are put in and 
its variations noted during the night. How 
many disasters we should have averted if 
we had noticed that the heat fell ten de- 
grees during the small hours of the morn- 
ing — the day before we put the chicks in, 
rather than the day after. 

To minimize the variation of temperature 
during the night, I insulate my brooder- 
house with sawdust, in the same way as the 
incubator-house, described in the last chap- 
ter. If the runs are five feet wide, I put 
in a window to each run, four feet six inches 
wide, so that I get the maximum amount 
of light possible into the house, which 
should face directly east or northeast. I 
duplicate these windows in the west side of 
the "house, so that the latter is flooded with 
light all day. The advantage of this method 
is that on hot, still days I can open the win- 
dows on both sides of the house and get a 
through draught over the heads of the 
chicks, which will be fast asleep in the 
straw below. The roof and walls being in- 
sulated, will never get hot and the tempera- 
ture of the house being lower than that of 
the air outside, there will be a good draught 
if the windows are opened on both sides. 

Again, lice, like another and higher class 
of animal, "love darkness rather than light," 
and if the house is lighted, as suggested, 
these objectionable creatures will not have 
so agreeable a resting place, as is frequently 
the case. 

I have not yet considered the question of 
feeding, because under the system which 
I advocate, this largely depends for its suc- 
cess upon the construction of the brooder- 
house. 

I felt for a long time that the practice of 
feeding chicks five times a day by hand was 
crude and objectioriable for two reasons. 
First, because of the immense labor in- 
volved, and secondly, because the results 
were most unsatisfactory. The chicks did 
not develop normally. There was an un- 
canny growth of wing in my Leghorns, with 
the result that the chicks could not support 
the weight, and went about with their wings 
trailing on the ground. 

The Cyphers Incubator Company sent me 
a pamphlet advocating the "scratch to live" 
method. They said that the trailing-wing 
phenomenon was due to lack of normal de- 
velopment of other parts of the body. The 
chick devoured the meals provided five 
times a day without any effort being re- 
quired by the leg muscles to get a full crop, 
with the result that the growth went into 
feathers instead of leg and other muscles. 
I felt sure they were right and adopted 



their method, with the most satisfactory 
results. 

I lowered the floor of the inside of the 
house two feet six inches away from the 
hover to a depth of eight inches. By leav- 
ing this space between the hover and the 
lower level of the floor, I had room to put 
the drinking water and the oyster shell and 
charcoal boxes, on the same level as the 
hover on a solid floor. I filled up the 
sunken floor to the level of the hover floor 
with litter, i.e., eight inches of litter; dis- 
posed as follows: Two inches of litter, 
then a layer of chick feed, then two inches 
of litter and another layer of chick feed un- 
til I had four layers of chick feed and four 
layers of litter, the latter each two inches 
deep. The pamphlet stated that sixty 
pounds of chick feed, disposed in this way 
in four layers of litter would feed fifty 
chicks for six weeks. 

Having made these arrangements, I put 
the chicks into the brooder-house. The 
first day I fed by hand three meals of stale 
bread crumbs, moistened with milk and the 
artificial ash liberally sprinkled upon them. 
The second day I left the chicks to scratch 
out their own living; giving them a little 
bran and corn meal with the artificial ash 
mixed dry and then slightly damped with 
milk (or water,) the last thing at night. I 
put a hopper of beef scrap into the run so 
that the chicks could help themselves at 
will. 

The chicks were let out in the morning 
of the day following their first night in the 
brooder-house. I built a scratching shed, 
with eight inches of litter as described in 
the pamphlet outside the brooder-house, by 
making a frame three feet wide and twenty 
feet long (the length of the brooder-house,) 
and covering it with water-proof canvas. 
This frame rested on a ledge below the win- 
dows made by nailing a two-by-two strip 
to the wall of the brooder-house and a simi- 
lar strip three feet away nailed to the up- 
rights of the runs, which were sunk in holes 
dug three feet from the brooder-house wall. 

The runs were sown to alfalfa and were 
seventy-five feet long and five feet wide (the 
width of the run inside the brooder-house.) 

By these arrangements the chicks could 
scratch in the shade inside the house or out- 
side. They could sleep under the hover or 
in the straw inside the house, or outside in 
the scratching shed or in the sunshine of 
the open run. 

Water was supplied by means of a drip 
cock attached to a small stand pipe, and 
with a cup below. I could thus leave the 
chicks to their own devices all day, having 
to feed them only once a day as the sun 
went down. The heat was provided by gas 
jets, one to each hover. The results in the 
quality of the chicks raised, and the labor 
saved were most satisfactory, and 5000 
chicks could probably be managed by one 
man in this way. 



13 



The chicks raised under hens were fed 
on the same principles. An inclosure was 
built, with a scratching shed inside and 
coops all round it. The hens with their 
broods returned every night to get the bran 
and corn meal with the artificial ash, when 
the door of the inclosure was closed for the 
night. 

Each hen went to her own coop and 
started scratching in the litter in the morn- 
ing until I came round and opened the door 
of the inclosure. As soon as this was 
done, the hens and their chicks went away 
for the day, returning at nightfall for sup- 
per. 



CHAPTER VII. 
POULTRY FARM SITES. 

This chapter will try to deal with the se- 
lection of a site for a poultry farm and of 
the poultry buildings on that farm. It 
assumes that a considerable acreage is to 
be or has been acquired, so that there is 
a choice of several sites for the poultry 
buildings. 

The chief factors in selecting a poultry 
farm would appear to be freedom from 
damp, i.e., ground which is either naturally 
well drained or where it can be made so 
by artificial means. Secondly, accessibility 
to markets; thirdly, a good and abundant 
water supply; fourthly, soils suitable for 
alfalfa; and fifth, the actual poultry build- 
ings on level ground to economize labor. 

I have put the question of a dry site 
first, because in Southern California this 
is the only danger to be guarded against 
when considering climatic conditions. In 
this part of the country, cold is a negligable 
factor. A good sharp frost will not hurt 
fowls, although if continued night after 
night, the egg yield might suffer, if the 
birds were not kept in a warm house. The 
health of the bird would not be affected, 
but the exposure would divert surplus 
energy from the production of eggs to the 
manufacture of more vital heat to keep the 
body warm. 

A curious case came to my notice where 
the conditions were such that proof was 
forthcoming that the surplus energy of five 
hens in a poultry-house was actually di- 
verted from egg production in this way. All 
the conditions for egg production were 
favorable, but the hens would not lay an 
egg. I found that the house was roofed 
with corrugated iron which draws the cold, 
and at 10 o'clock at night the backs of the 
hens, under the roof, were white with 
frost. A ceiling of matched boards was put 
in about four inches below the corrugated 
iron, when egg production began at once 
and the birds laid heavily. The non-pro- 
duction of eggs does not necessarily imply 
ill health on the part of the birds, but that 
either the surplus energy is diverted from 
egg production, or that it is not the result 



of feeding adapted for the production of 
eggs, in which case it may be stored as 
fat in the body, if not required to combat 
cold, or again there may be no surplus 
energy, owing to insufficient nutrition. It 
is quite possible to give a maintenance 
ration to hens, which will support them in 
good health, but which will not admit of 
any surplus for egg production. 

The frosts in Southern California are not 
sufficiently severe, nor continuous to make 
them a factor to be considered. 

Shade from the heat is a more important 
question which must be considered and pro- 
vided either by natural or artificial means, 
but the real enemy is damp of long con- 
tinuance after wet weather. If the fowl- 
house is damp for any length of time, owing 
to the site being deficient of drainage, egg 
production will cease entirely. 

I had a few hens about 500 yards from 
a large sheet of water lying in a shallow 
pan-shaped depression. The fowl-house was 
about fifteen feet above the water, but the 
mist rose every night from the "pan" and 
the birds would not lay an egg. I removed 
them about thirty feet higher up and 500 
yards further away from the water and egg 
production began at once. This is only one 
of many instances which have been brought 
to my notice of the deadly effect of damp 
in the fowl-house, on the egg yield. 

It sometimes happens that the only site 
available is at the bottom of a hill. If the 
hill is high and steep, it may be found im- 
possible even by drainage to keep the land 
at the foot dry owing to the seepage from 
the hill above continuing for weeks after 
wet weather, or there may be underground 
springs in the hillside. In this case poul- 
try raising will never be possible, since 
during the rainy season when eggs are high 
in price, no eggs will be obtained from the 
pullets. I reported upon a site of this 
kind in Northern California, where the 
poultry buildings were surrounded on two 
sides by lofty and precipitous hills, with 
the result that the poultry-houses wreaked 
with damp during six months of the year. 
Practically no eggs had ever been obtained 
after the beginning of the rainy season, un- 
til the following March or April, and the 
business was a dead loss. 

Curiously enough on the same farm not 
1000 yards away was the most ideal site 
for a large poultry farm which I have ever 
seen, and a description of which will illus- 
trate, I think, the question of a good site. 

There was a flat-topped low hill running 
for over a mile on the west side of a val- 
ley. The hill was probably 100 feet above 
the valley. From the rim of the flat top 
the ground fell away steeply for a hundred 
yards, and then sloped gently to the bot- 
tom of the valley. The whole of this slope 
was under alfalfa, of which there was forty 
acres along the hillside. The soil on the 
steepest part of the hill and on the flat top 



14 



was shallow but deep enough to grow crops 
of oats and barley. The flat top was 200 
yards wide. I designed a row of poultry- 
houses on each rim of the flat top, with 
runs running down into the alfalfa, and 
alternating runs 100 yards wide behind the 
houses on the flat top, with motor car 
road running midway between the houses — 
thus having the alternating runs on both 
sides of this road. 

The water supply came direct from a 
reservoir 1200 feet away across a ravine, 
and about fifty feet above the flat-topped 
hill. 

The owner objected that the top of the 
hill would be cold. I asked him why his 
sheep always slept on the top of the hill 
and not on the sides or bottom. He ad- 
mitted that they did so, but that the reason 
had never occurred to him. In South 
Africa and California it is always much 
warmer at night on the top of a hill than 
it is on the sides or bottom. The Dutch 
have occupied South Africa for several hun- 
dred years and you will always find their 
houses on high ground. So again on hot 
summer nights, it is cooler on the top of 
the hill than it is at the sides and bottom. 
Campaigning in South Africa taught me the 
truth of this, and I always slept on the 
hilltop if I could. I noticed that the wild 
birds always had their nests on the hill- 
tops and the deer will be found in such 
places at daybreak, more frequently than in 
the bottoms. 

On the other hand, fowls love to run in 
the wet bottoms in the daytime, where the 
grass is greenest and animal life abundant. 
This is ideal for them, provided that they 
are not kept there at nights, but can re- 
turn to the high ground to roost. 

From the foregoing I think it will be 
clear that we must in selecting a poultry 
farm, give our chief consideration to the 
question of drainage. Where a site at the 
bottom of a hill is forced upon us, an elab- 
orate system of drainage must be installed 
to carry off the storm water and prevent it 
from coming down into the bottom where 
the poultry is. Deep drains cut across 
the face of the hill to bring the water from 
above into a conduit running through the 
ground below will be essential. 

Referring again to our flat-topped hill, 
we have an ilustration of the advantage of 
having all the poultry buildings on level 
ground. The ground on our flat-topped hill 
was as level "as a billiard board," and 
every part of the plant could be reached 
from the feed house on hard level ground 
by a wheelbarrow. The rock underlying 
the layer of soil kept the ground hard and 
firm after heavy rains. It is a serious 
drawback to have to feed poultry from a 
wheelbarrow pushed or dragged through 
marshy ground, and where this is liable to 
occur a pathway of boards or asphalt be- 



comes a necessity, between the feed house 
and the poultry runs. 

The question of a market is one of which 
the importance is evident and must be 
carefully considered in relation to every 
site contemplated as generally suitable in 
other respects. 

Alfalfa is almost a necessity of life on 
the modern poultry farm, since the success 
or failure of a poultry business is mainly 
determined by the amount of labor required 
to operate it. To have to grow other green 
food for the fowls means a very serious 
addition to the labor bill, since the ground 
must first be prepared, then the kale or 
other green stuff sown, kept free from 
weeds and watered regularly. It has then 
to be gathered, cut up and fed to the 
poultry. 

If alfalfa is firmly established in the 
runs, the fowls cannot root it up or eat it 
off, provided that the proportion of poultry 
to the acreage of alfalfa is not too large. 
Again, the alfalfa is practically growing all 
the year here and absorbs the droppings 
of the poultry quickly so that the ground 
does not become foul. It is needless to 
dwell upon the advantage to the birds of 
unlimited green food at any time of the day. 

The writer believes that the alfalfa lands 
of California will ultimately ensure 
that a great industry will be established 
here and that the economic advantage 
which, with the sunlight, they give to our 
poultrymen, will enable the latter in the 
long run to compete successfully with the 
East, and export their eggs and poultry by 
the million dollars' worth to States which 
have not our climatic advantages. 



CHAPTER VIM. 
POULTRY BUILDINGS. 

It is here assumed that the open-front 
house for poultry is now generally accepted 
as the type of house which has replaced 
all previous types and is destined to be 
universally used, except in countries where 
the temperature falls below zero daily for 
months together during the winter. 

In many parts of Northern California 
there are sharp frosts every night for sev- 
eral weeks during the winter, and a house 
hermetically closed on the back and sides 
and open in front is necessary to prevent 
the surplus energy of the poultry being di- 
verted from egg producton to the manu- 
facture of heat to combat the cold. 

In some sections of the country, notably 
in the mountains, the cold is very severe 
at nights, and egg production is seriously 
affected. In these districts, the open-front 
house may be made warmer without sacri- 
ficing the open front by using the box 
roost. This consists in putting droppings 
boards about six inches under the perches 
which should all be on the same level. 



15 



These droppings boards may be made of 
half-inch thick lumber in sections about 
four feet square, which can easily be pulled 
out through a slot cut in the back of the 
house. These sections of droppings boards 
rest on slides fixed under the perches. 
Thus if the house is twelve feet wide, three 
sections of droppings board will be re- 
quired, which will rest when - in position 
on a piece of 2-inch by 2-inch lumber nailed 
horizontally to the back wall six inches 
below the perches and a similar piece of 
2x2-inch lumber reaching from side to side 
of the house four feet from the back wall. 
The slot cut in the back of the house 
should be six inches wide to enable the sec- 
tions of droppings board to be easily pulled 
out and the droppings scraped off into the 
wheelbarrow. The slot must be kept closed 
by a closely fitting door hinged from the 
top and secured by a button on the wall 
below. Over the perches, similar half-inch 
boards rest on slides, to form a roof three 
feet above the perches at the back and two 
feet six inches at the front. This roof forms 
the top and the droppings boards below 
the perches the bottom of the box roost, 
while the back and sides of the house form 
the back and sides of the box. This box 
roost still has the open front, but the heat 
generated by the birds instead of escaping 
immediately to the roof of the house, is 
retarded by the box roof three feet over- 
head, so that the temperature in the box 
roost is materially increased. Again, the 
birds have two roofs over their heads, viz., 
the box roost roof and the roof of the 
house, which further increases the warmth 
of the birds. 

In Southern California, I do not think 
that the open-front house hermetically 
sealed on the back and sides, is necessary. 
We can dispense with the back and sides 
altogether, retaining only the roof to keep 
the sun and rain off. I have recently de- 
signed and built for a client near Los An- 
geles, buildings of this kind to hold 400 
birds. The dimensions are 45 feet long by 
24 feet wide. The ridge may be 9 feet high 
and the open sides 5 feet high. These are 
boarded up at the bottom 3 feet to keep in 
the litter and provide cover for the birds 
from the sun and wind. A row of uprights 
are placed 4 feet from the sides of the 
house. These uprights are 3 feet apart 
and reach to the roof, forming an aisle on 
each side of the house 4 feet wide. A bar 
running the whole length of the house is 
fastened to these uprights 4 feet from the 
ground. On this bar, rest one end of the 
droppings boards, the other end of which 
rests on another bar fastened one-half an 
inch below the top of the boards forming 
the sides of the house. As these latter are 
3 feet high only, the droppings boards will 
have a slope from the top of 1 foot in 4 
feet — the width of the aisle. Bars are 
fastened horizontally across the aisle just 



above the upper end of the droppings board 
at intervals of 9 feet. The perches run- 
ning the whole length of the house rest in 
slots in the cross bars. The birds there- 
fore sleep in the open air nearly one foot 
under the roof, the eaves of which should 
project about one foot over the side of the 
house. All bars carrying roosts or drop- 
pings boards are removable, as they rest 
in cheap iron holders, as shown in sketch 
(Fig. 1). The perches rest in slots made 
of small pieces of iron bent to a right angle 
and screwed into the bar (Fig. 2). The bar 
should be tarred before these slots are 
screwed on. 

The nest's boxes are arranged on each 
side of the uprights which carry the ridge 
pole. The detail of the nests is shown in 
Pig. 3 and their position in Fig. 4 (Section). 
Fig. 5 shows the elevation of the house. 

Tf desired, the floor of the shed may be 
divided into five compartments by putting 
a board 1x12 inch on edge across the 
house every nine feet. This makes it 
easier to renew the litter, as the whole 
floor space need not then be renewed at 
one time. 

If we build the house 45x24 feet we get 
nearly 1100 square feet of litter for 400 
birds, or 2% square feet of litter to each 
hen. 

Experience shows that on hot days, the 
birds will sleep under the droppings boards 
at the side of the house. These droppings 
boards with the roof of the house, form 
two roofs over the birds in the straw 
beneath, and the latter evidently find this 
part of the house is the coolest. 

The nest boxes are also provided with 
a roof and a partially open back to allow 
plenty of air on hot days. 

During the great storm of rain with the 
wind blowing a gale, which occurred in Los 
\ngeles in February of this year, the birds 
remained dry and healthy in these sheds 
which I have been describing and no sick- 
ness of any kind occurred. A more severe 
test of the shed house open on all sides 
is not likely to occur in Southern Cali- 
fornia, and I venture to believe that this 
class of building is destined to be largely 
used in this part of the State. 

The droppings boards are simply laid 
side by side across the aisle, and are not 
fastened down. They can thus be easily 
removed for cleaning. To further facilitate 
this, the boards are made of ^-inch lum- 
ber (redwood) and are very light. Troughs 
wide enough to admit a spade are fixed as 
shown in Fig. 4, so that the droppings roll 
off the boards into them. The poultryman 
with a spade and barrow can quickly re- 
move the contents of the troughs, there be- 
ing a free passage all round the house. 



16 



Figure 5 shows the section of a house 
closed on two sides and the back, suitable 
for the colder sections of the State. The 
nest boxes are outside and box roosts are 
fitted together with a slot at the back of 
the house so that the droppings boards can 
be pulled out at the back. This is a great 



advantage, as the droppings can then be 
dumped direct into the barrow or wagon 
and the necessity of going into the house 
to clean the boards is avoided. 

Sections of a brooder-house and incubator- 
house, both insulated with sawdust, are 
given in Figures 6a and 7. 




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19 



Petaluma, California 



has more Hatcheries than 
any other place in the world. 
Most of the present "Big 
Hatcheries" put in but a few 
Incubators to start with, but 
have added to the number 
each year. Mr. H. Graff be- 
gan buying Petaluma Incu- 
bators of 504 eggs capacity in 
1909. His big incubator house 
is now filled with machines 
double decked. Mr. W. L. 
Sales also begaa buying 504 
Qs;g Petaluma Incubators in 
1909, and has continued until 
he has now 112 of these large 
machines. A great many 
others have from twenty to 
sixty of these 504 egg Incubators and are materially adding to their 
hatching capacity. It is quite a common thing for people in ordering 
"day old chicks" from the hatcheries to specify, "These chicks must 
be hatched in Petaluma Incubators." There is a reason. If Petaluma 
Incubators prove to be so eminently satisfactory to these men of wide 
experience, they will be so to you. The continued buying of Petaluma 
Incubators by the hatchery men is monumental testimony to the effi- 
ciency of these Incubators. Better see us or get our Catalog before 
you buy an Incubator. 

PETALUMA INCUBATOR CO. 




Petaluma, Calif. 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 



002 866 836 3 



y 



Devonshire's 
Stock and Poultry Salts 

These salts are quite harmless and contain no noxious drugs. 
They merely reinforce the natural supply of mineral matter in the 
soils and foodstuffs, which is often not available in sufficient amount 
to stock and poultry. A shortage of mineral ash in the ration pro- 
duces debility — the forerunner of disease. 

Sold at the Head Office of the Company, 503 North Broadway; 
also by the Poultryman's Co-operative Association, 324-330 Los An- 
geles Street, Los Angeles, California; also by Messrs. Germain, Seeds- 
men, 326 South Main Street, and by all dealers. 

Price 35 cents per pound 

Special quotations for large quantities can be had on application 
to the Head Office. 

Application made for registration under the Food and Drugs Act, 
U. S. A. 

Telephone F 5251 



